The Heavens declare the Glory of God!
The Lord be with you!
The five Marks of Mission of the Anglican Church are:
- To proclaim the Good News of the Kingdom.
- To teach, baptize, and nurture new believers.
- To respond to human need by loving service.
- To seek to transform unjust structures of society, to challenge violence of every kind and to pursue peace and reconciliation.
- To strive to safeguard the integrity of creation and sustain and renew the life of the earth.
Our Ministry Plan is designed around us achieving these 5 objectives. As we adjust to addressing our ministry to meet the emerging reality of a COVD-19 world, we are asking ourselves; how do we continue to achieve the objectives of the Church by using different methodology? Hopefully by now we are associating Church less with a place or a building, and more with a community of believers all working “with Christ and in Christ and through Christ” to have “Thy(God’s) will done on earth as it is in heaven.”
Our first duty as Christians is to pray. Prayer is responding to God, seeking to live according to His plan for our lives. We all know that this is simply stated as “to love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength and with all your mind, and love your neighbour as you love yourself.” (Luke 10: 27).
As an organised community we aim to provide the leadership the guidance and the means to achieve this.
Today I call upon us all to recommit to our Christian lifestyle (APB 434):
- To come to God in personal prayer every day;
- Read the bible daily;
- Receive Holy Communion frequently and in expectant faith – even in this time of Physical Distancing we have found an effective way to share in the Eucharist and I encourage you to participate on Wednesday at 08h00 (ZOOM) and on Sundays at 08h00 (WhatsApp – St Francis Eucharist) and at 09h00 on Zoom;
- Follow the example of Jesus in Daily life – to do this you have to know what He did when He walked the earth, by reading the Gospel accounts of His life;
- Speak about Jesus openly as the Lord whom you know, yesterday we were again reminded as we commemorated St James and St John, that we are called to say “come and see” the easiest way to speak openly at present is to share the text, Facebook and Instagram posts that you receive. By reposting the Churches posts on your profile you are speaking openly about your faith;
- Work for justice and reconciliation, holding leadership accountable and assisting where you can, to support the work in the community is a great start;
- Uphold Christian standards in marriage, respect each other See Ephesians 5:21and 31;
- Bring up Children to love and serve the Lord, fashion your household on these 10 life choices, develop a family participation in worship See Ephesians 6:1-4;
- Give money for God’s work and to consider the claims of tithing, join our dedicated giving program, make your alms giving (what was loose plate offerings), by making additional deposits on a weekly or adhoc basis.
[Parish of St Marys, Kingsburgh FNB– Galleria: 22 01 27 Account: 625 400 953 89]
[Parish of Amanzimtoti FNB– Galleria: 22 01 27 Account: 552 457 835 49]
- Give personal service to the Church and to your neighbour, there are many areas of ministry that we need your skills, at present we are asking for people to join the phone ministry team – here you are given a list of names of people to contact and check up on, and people who live alone are particularly in need of care. Keeping an eye out for your neighbour and making sure that they are doing okay, sharing the love of Christ with them, even if it is not physical contact. Your neighbour is all those in your circle of influence, again forwarding messages, including them in your faith life, has never been as easy;
- Let your life be marked with self -denial and simplicity, Christians always overcome in a disaster because they know how to do these two things, reordering your life when there is great loss, can only be done by accepting self -denial and simplicity.
Stewardship is exercising our duty to administer what God has entrusted to us and to serve Him gladly. (APB 435).
Let us be faithful stewards, for further reflection on stewardship see, Matthew 25:14-27.
Let us be faithful and commit ourselves to our Saviour, let us be courageous, let us choose faith not fear!
Be assured of my prayers.
Rector.